


the sharpest rocks are igneous

by shadowcat500



Series: Plaguetober 2020 [8]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M, Mentions of Death, Plague Doctors, Plaguetober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:07:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26801911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowcat500/pseuds/shadowcat500
Summary: Crocus and Nendril find a link between the plague, the Burning and the Cavern Ruler.
Relationships: Original Male Character/Original Male Character
Series: Plaguetober 2020 [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948417
Kudos: 1





	the sharpest rocks are igneous

**Author's Note:**

> 08/10 Heirloom

The patient looks far better than Nendril would have expected.

Pale skin, and faint traces of blood on the palms, but otherwise she looks almost completely normal. It would be great news, if the patient hadn’t already been showing symptoms for almost three weeks.

“So, how long does it normally take to, you know, _take_.”

“You’re doing marvellously, ma’am. Far longer without falling to it than any patient I’ve seen. In fact, I’d love to know your sleep schedule, diet, exercise and-”

Crocus butts in. “What he means to say is that he’d like to know what you do on the daily so he can see if it’s anything you do that’s kept the plague off so long, so he can use it to help other patients. You don’t have to, but it would be amazing if you could. Don’t you agree, Nendril?”

“Yes. It would be amazing if you could do that. Thank you for putting it like that, my love.”

Crocus flushes pink behind his mask. “No problem.”

“I would be happy to, if you two _lovebirds_ are done.” The woman leans back a fraction as she smirks, but there’s a kind tilt to her mouth that makes Nendril think she’s happy for them rather than irritated for getting a bit distracted.

Nendril’s flush matches Crocus’, and he’s suddenly glad for the lenses and cloth of his mask as he turns back to the patient. “If you could start with your sleep schedule, that would be pleasant.”

“Well, I wake up with the dawn, and go to sleep around ten at night.”

Nendril hmms and notes her response down on a scrap piece of paper he was probably saving for a prescription. “Continue.”

“For breakfast I normally eat a slice of bread and a hard-boiled egg, for lunch I eat more bread with some cheese, and some vegetables from our garden if they’re in season.”

“Like what?”

“Celery, tomato, cucumber. Salad vegetables. Anyway, dinner varies depending if we have any meat, but we normally have either bread or potatoes with whatever vegetables are in season. If we have meat, we’ll sometimes have a bit of that as well.”

“Hm. I can’t see anything that differs. Are you particularly devout? The favour of a deity may be keeping you safe.”

“Not particularly. I pray to Sol and Bey, same as any other farmer, and pray to the others on their holy days.”

“Do you have any amulets of luck or against disease around your home?”

“No, but I do have this charm my mother gave me.” The woman pulls out a small necklace from beneath the collar of her shirt, the charm a stone ring with twigs plaited around it. “She said her mother gave it to her, and her mother’s mother before that, and so on.”

“An ancestral charm… do you mind if I sketch this quickly? It may be of use.”

“Take all the time you need! I scheduled the entire day off for this appointment, so my sons are picking up the slack. I’d rather spend all day here rather than risk getting them sick.”

Before long, the small charm is copied into Nendril’s journal. Crocus gives the usual pleasantries as he guides the woman out of the house and advises her to not take the amulet off at all costs, and to keep a distance from her family till a cure for the disease is found. Nendril stays focussed on the drawing, eyes tracing the fresh willow twigs plaited around the little hagstone.

***

The night is unseasonably cold, cold enough to comfortably wear a dressing gown in the middle of June. Nendril thinks someone angered Ireus and Zeznia, maybe a forgotten sacrifice on Ireus’ holy day a few weeks ago. It’s not like it was on purpose (probably), there _is_ a plague happening and not everyone can remember to burn an offering when a loved one is dying. 

He sits at his desk, candle lit, scribbling out the last of his observations into his journal. The sketch of the charm had been copied in first, with a blank swathe next to it for whatever Crocus found out about it in his research.

The other man was seated on the opposite side of the table, their few books on charms and amulets in two piles, one on either side of him, and one book lying open before him. His hand is supporting the side of his face, fingers entwined in his dark hair. It takes Nendril a few moments to notice he’s staring, but it’s not like Crocus would really care if he kept looking. Nendril’s known him long enough to recognise hyperfocus when he sees it. He just hopes his boyfriend snaps out of it before the sun rises.

***

“It’s miasma! From the earth!”

Nendril stirs back to reality, the bowl of porridge in front of him half-eaten but thankfully still warm. “…What?”

Crocus stand in the doorway, open book braced in the crook of his left elbow. His eyes are wide and excited, mask probably abandoned on a desk in their office/library/general infection-free workplace, but he looks like hell. Guess he didn’t go to sleep before the sun rose after all. “It’s, I’ve been researching and I think I cracked the plague! It’s miasma in revenge for the Burning eight centuries ago!”

“Can you explain it more fully? Start at the beginning.”

“Well last night I got _really_ invested in this book about the Burning and the Earth priest purges, and then a word stuck out to me: Stormpoint village!”

Crocus looks like he expects Nendril to be reacting somewhat, but Nendril has never heard of Stormpoint in his life. “I don’t know where that is.”

“Well, Stormpoint was the last place where an Earth priest got revenge during the Burning! When they tried to kill their local priest and his daughter, the next day the entire town was in ruins and the townsfolk were gone!”

“And why is Stormpoint important?”

“You’ve heard the rumours, haven’t you? The last survivor of Stormpoint is the only one who can make the cure, according to Swift’s oracles that is. The village was destroyed on the night they tried to purge their Earth priests, so obviously the Cavern Ruler has something to do with the plague!”

“Keep it down! Do you want the entire guard to come down on our heads for speaking about the Cavern Ruler!?” Nendril hisses, before taking a deep breath and running a hand through their hair. “And I think you skipped a point. What’s the link between the plague and the Burning?”

“The last survivor has to be a priest. An entire village doesn’t get destroyed because they killed a pair of Earth priests, one of which was a _child_ by the way, and won. The Cav- _They_ protect their own. And the Earth priest being the only one capable of curing it _must_ mean that their patron must be involved!”

“Crocus, I won’t get your hopes up. I don’t think the Cavern Ruler caused the plague. The Earth priests were often skilled healers, right? So logically the cure must be some knowledge of theirs the Sky healers didn’t pick up.” Nendril knows getting shot down must have hurt, but Crocus doesn’t appear even slightly off-put.

“Now see, that’s what I would have thought, but you know the lady earlier today, with the charm? She’s been having the first symptoms for more than triple the time it normally takes to knock the victim into a coma, but I was researching the charm and it’s,” Crocus flips the book open to another place he’d kept his finger in: “This! An Earth priest charm! Specifically from around the Vokal woods area. But nowadays we call that the Ashfruit Fields, because the Vokal woods burnt down.”

“So an Earth priest charm against disease still working against a plague means that the plague must originate from Them?”

“Everyone knows disease is Their domain! A disease where the only cure is by finding the last survivor of an attack against the Earth priests sounds like their work to me.”

“…Makes sense, though more from the where disease originates angle. Sorry for doubting you earlier.”

“No harm done, I can’t expect you to know all about human religion.”

Nendril smiles slightly. “Like I can’t expect you to know about Elven gods?”

“Exactly!” Crocus walks past them to the stove. “Did you leave any porridge for me?”

“Always.”

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, I know this one got a little heavy on the worldbuilding, but this is the first time a lot of this actually came up.
> 
> I’m a little worried that I’m misrepresenting Crocus’ ADHD. I tried not to write him as a hyperactive “SQUIRREL!” ADHD stereotype, I basically just wrote him as a me that never had to mask his hyperactivity and impulsivity, but he still got a bit of that “stop and think things through” that I got because of my masking and anxiety. Please say something if you think I’m writing his ADHD wrong, I basically only just talked over that I most likely have ADHD with my therapist. 
> 
> Check out my [ tumblr](https://existentialcrisisetcetera.tumblr.com/tagged/zach%20writes)!
> 
> Comments and kudos appreciated!


End file.
